All Posts Tagged With: "Fifth Amendment"

Supreme Neglect: How to Revive Constitutional Protection for Private Property

The framers of the Constitution were acutely aware that politics—even in the highly limited democracy they envisioned—could be dangerous to private property. For that reason they added the “takings” clause to the Fifth Amendment: “Nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.” Unfortunately, like so much other constitutional language intended to [...]

2Apr2009 | George C. Leef | 1 comment | Continued

Net Neutrality or Government Brutality?

Over the past six years or so, network neutrality, or “net neutrality,” has risen from an obscure techie buzz phrase to a bona fide political issue and rallying cry for some strange political bedfellows. The current debate comprises competing views on economics, regulation, free speech, property rights, and even the supposed rights of individuals and [...]

1Jul2008 | Adam B. Summers | 5 comments | Continued

Is the Income Tax Unconstitutional?

Wishful thinking, always a temptation, is hazardous. Example: An awful lot of people think the income tax as it applies to private-sector wage earners is illegal—even unconstitutional—and they assume that if they can only come up with the right legal arguments, judges will strike down the tax and make America a free society once more. [...]

1Sep2006 | Sheldon Richman | 19 comments | Continued

Kelo v. City of New London: Do We Need Eminent Domain for Economic Growth?

The Supreme Court continues to give politicians free rein to trample the rights of individuals except in cases where the justices think that the rights are fundamental. Property rights are not regarded as fundamental, and the Court will accept almost any justification, no matter how nave and intellectually feeble, for government encroachments on them.

1Nov2005 | George C. Leef | 0 comments | Continued

The Supreme Court and the End of Limited Government

The Supreme Court ruling permitting governments
forcibly to transfer property through eminent
domain from one private party to another
for the sake of economic development did not come out
of the blue. Although the Takings Clause in the Fifth
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution specifies “nor shall
private property be taken for public use without just
compensation,” the “Court long ago rejected any literal
requirement that condemned property be put into use
for the general public” (Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff,
1984, cited in the current case, Kelo v. City of New
London).

1Nov2005 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | Continued

A Popular Insurrection on Property Rights

The property rights issues that arise constantly in
modern life are always difficult and often
obscure. Most ordinary people understand the
importance of zoning restrictions and environmental
protection in their daily lives.They are also keenly aware
that the state exercises its eminent domain power whenever
it condemns land for a post office or a public highway.
But in general they rightly feel a little intimidated
if asked to understand the inner workings of a legal system
that is dominated at every turn by an impenetrable
jargon that even trained lawyers find it
hard to manipulate.

1Nov2005 | Richard A. Epstein | 0 comments | Continued

Protecting Property in a Post-Kelo World

Two years ago, when I began writing a book,
peoples eyes would glaze over when I told them
the subject was eminent domain, the power of
the government to take property by force on just
compensation to the owner. Rarely could I mention the
subject without having to explain it in detail, and
incredulity was a typical response to the realization that
government now takes property for private uses rather
than for the public uses allowed by the
Constitution.

1Nov2005 | Steven Greenhut | 0 comments | Continued

Unjust Compensation

When discussing eminent-domain horror stories with government officials and other defenders of the practice, one will often hear a refrain of this sort: “None of this is any big deal, really, because the victims of eminent domain must be made financially whole, under the law.” But, just as the Constitution’s clear requirement that government only [...]

1Mar2005 | Steven Greenhut | 1 comment | Continued

Telecom Regulations Don’t Create Competitive Markets

The author would like to thank Diane Katz, director of science, environment, and technology policy at the Mackinac Center, for her assistance in the preparation of this column. Few of us would understand the jargon employed in a recent ruling overturning telecommunications regulations issued by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). But it’s not necessary to [...]

1May2004 | Lawrence W. Reed | 1 comment | Continued

Taking Liberties . . . and Properties

It’s happened again. A local government is condemning a group of homes so the land can be turned over to the developer of a shopping center. Why? The shopping center will rake in more tax revenue than the homes do. The use of eminent domain to raise money for government is catching on. We’ve seen [...]

1Jan2004 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | Continued

The Obstacle Course of the Takings Clause

Timothy Sandefur is a contributing editor of Liberty Magazine. The Fifth Amendment holds that government may not take “private property . . . for public use without just compensation.” The Framers knew that seizing a person’s property always violates his rights, but providing for government payment would at least protect citizens from the worst sorts [...]

1Jan2002 | Timothy Sandefur | 1 comment | Continued

Unrestrained Appetites, Unlimited Government

The federal government was supposed to be limited to a few defined powers. The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution—“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people”—confirms it. The federal government, of course, does not at [...]

1May1998 | Jeffrey R. Snyder | 6 comments | Continued

The Pine Barrens Parousia: A Reporter’s Notebook

Matthew Carolan is executive editor of National Review. For additional information, contact the Civil Property Rights Associates, P.O. Box 202, Brightwaters, NY 11718, (516) 665-2020. Circling the corner of Doe Run in Manorville, New York, my guides and I came across a young married couple discussing with their landscaper the finer points of decorative rock [...]

1Aug1997 | Matthew Carolan | 0 comments | Continued

Transfer of Development Rights: Top-Down Planning in Disguise

Ms. Foster is an associate of the Western Journalism Center. Radicals of the 1930s had a favorite saying: Take it easy, but take it. That is to say, a step-by-step, easy-does-it approach is the most efficient and palatable way to implement socialism. Their intellectual heirs understand the principle even better, and have had over 60 [...]

1Aug1997 | Sarah Foster | 0 comments | Continued

Today’s Fight for Property Rights

Bob and Mary McMackin bought property in Pennsylvania’s Pocono mountains and obtained all the necessary permits to build a retirement home. But four years after they moved in, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decreed that their property was a “wetland” — even though it was dry. Result: they were ordered to destroy all landscaping [...]

1Jun1996 | Nancie G. Marzulla | 0 comments | Continued

Taking Taxes: The Case for Invalidating the Welfare State

Mr. Kochan is a student at Cornell Law School and an adjunct scholar with the Mackinac Center for Public Policy Research in Midland, Michigan. As attempts to downsize the welfare state continue, reformers are relying primarily on practical arguments—that transfer programs waste taxpayers’ funds and hurt the poor, for instance. They do, but there is [...]

1Feb1996 | Donald J. Kochan | 2 comments | Continued

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